Last week I finally caved and purchased an Amazon Fire TV. I was very skeptical for awhile about purchasing one, especially since initial consumer reviews considered it an “in-beta” product and that the USB port on it doesn’t even support external hard drives or thumbdrives yet. However, a colleague of mine raved about it since it has the capability to accept XBMC and other 3rd part applications, so he actually bought 5 of them. Also, since I created Maddie Bear’s Snack Time for the Fire TV, it seemed like I should be able to test it for myself on an actual device.

Unboxing/Set Up/App Development

Unboxing it reminded me of unboxing the Apple TV. It was just the unit, remote, and a power cord. Setup was also the same, just plug it in and hook it to your TV via HDMI cable and the unit powers up. One thing that I thought was strange is that there’s no way to hook the Fire TV to your computer for app development, it has to be done through your Terminal/Command window. Once you have your Fire TV set up, you’ll have to go into the Settings > About and get its IP address. Then on your computer, connect to it via Terminal/Command window to push apps via adb commands (./adb connect <ip address> ; ./adb install AppName.apk ; etc.). This is pretty easy and I suppose it does save you the time from having to attach/detach the unit from your computer over and over.

Memory

Memory is kind of an issue depending on how many apps/games you plan on installing. After the operating system and XBMC, I had a little over 5 gigs of space left. This doesn’t sound terrible until you consider the fact that a lot of the higher-end games take 2-4 gigs of hard drive space. For example, Grand Theft Auto San Andreas takes up almost a gig. Then when you go to play, it says it needs to install another 2 gigs of data. If I were able to hook a thumb drive to the Fire TV and install games on that, it wouldn’t be a big deal, but since it wanted over half my available space, I opted not to install GTA.

Game Controller

Amazon Fire TV Remote and Game Controller

Games and apps are categorized as Remote support or Game Controller support. Initially my game Maddie Bear’s Snack Time only supported the remote because I didn’t own a device to map out the game controls. I purchased a game controller and was able to add controller support by the following day. From a consumer standpoint, I do prefer games with controller capability, it makes it feel like you’re playing a real video game and not just an Android app that was ported over last second. Also, as a consumer, I really want there to be more great games available. The more I play on the Fire TV, the more I find myself enjoying the experience as a gaming machine.

Amazon Coins

If you do develop a game for the Fire TV and integrate Game Circle, Amazon is running a promotion where they’ll give you Amazon coins to give out to your customers. For example, (at the time of this writing) if you purchase GTA San Andreas, you’ll get $20 worth of Amazon coins as a bonus. Unfortunately, Corona SDK does not support Game Circle as of this moment, so Corona-made apps are not available for the Amazon Coin promotion. If you’re thinking about making an app with game controller support, I would purchase a game controller as soon as possible. Amazon is running a limited-time promotion where you receive $10 of Amazon coins and a $7 game, “Sev Zero”, with the purchase of a game controller. So essentially, you can buy a $40 game controller, get $10 of free coins, get $7 Sev for free, buy GTA for $7 with the coins, get another $20 of free coins, and end up with $14 of games, $33 of Amazon Coins, and a game controller for $40.

Since Amazon is giving away from coins like candy, it’s helping indie developer app sales. Where normally people might be hesitant to purchase a game that only has 1 or 2 reviews, now they’re free to buy it since they’re just using coins they got for free. The more developers are able to give away free coins from feature Game Circle apps, the more it helps the community as well. If you’re looking for a great platform to check out, I’d recommend getting a Fire TV.

I recently had to delete numerous apps off of my iPad because my hard drive was getting full. I realized that even though I had tons of apps installed, I only used a handful of them on a regular basis (aside from the usual apps like Facebook, Twitter, Mail, Dropbox, Safari, Weather, etc.). I decided to create a list of the most useful apps I have in hopes that they’ll help you, too.

1.) Wunderlist – Free or Paid – (iOS, OSX, Android, Web browser) – This is one of my favorite apps to stay organized. You can create custom To-Do lists and share them with your friends and family. My wife and I use a shared grocery list, so as we think of things we need from the store, we can add them and we can both see the list update in real-time. I also use lists for daily to-do, work projects, personal projects and the like. It’s completely free to use, which is great for personal use, but if you’d like to use it for your business and need more features, there’s a Pro version available for $4.99 USD a month or $49.99 USD a year.

2.) oneSafe – Paid – (iOS, OSX) – oneSafe will run you $5.99 USD for the iOS version and $12.99 USD for the OSX version. While this sounds like a lot for an app, considering how great the software is, it’s actually a bargain. oneSafe securely stores all of your information such as credit cards, bank accounts, social security numbers, documents, pictures, license numbers and anything else you can think of. It has numerous options for secure access such as PIN, password, pattern, etc. and you can add double security on your data. There’s a self-destruct mode that you can enable in case your device gets stolen and the culprits fails to guess your passcode and security question answers. You might be wondering why you would bother storing your credit card number in an app on your phone when you’ve got your wallet on you as well. Say your wallet or purse gets stolen and you’ve got to cancel your credit cards. What phone numbers do you call? What was the credit card number on the card that was stolen? With oneSecure, you’ll have all of that information ready to go on your iOS device and Mac computer. Plus, it’s just great to have all of my usernames and passwords to my online accounts saved in one spot in case I forget them.

3.) DocuSign Ink – Free – (iOS, Android) – Anyone who does contract work will love this app. Even if you don’t do contract work, it’s still great to have on your mobile device. I first downloaded it when I bought my first house and had to sign and fax numerous forms. Using DocuSign Ink, you can open documents from your email, fill them out, digitally sign them, and email them back all without having to print, scan, or fax a single form. The only thing I had to pay for was to add a second person’s signature to a form, which I believe was a 99 cent in-app purchase, and it was well worth it. This is the easiest way I’ve found to quickly fill out and submit documents on my iPad.

4.) Remote File Browser – Free or Paid – (iOS Free, iOS Paid) – I downloaded this app because I wanted a free way to get to the files on the hard drive that I have hooked up to my AirPort Extreme. On your Mac, the hard drive will automatically appear. However, to view the hard drive and its files on an iOS device, you’ll need an app to do so. Remote File Browser allows you to view images, video and documents from your AirPort Extreme or AirPort Time Capsule devices. I only have experience with the free version, which comes with a banner ad, but it works just as advertised.

5.) System Status – Free or Paid – (iOS Free, iOS Paid) – For some reason, even on iOS 7, there’s no percentage marker on the battery life of your iPhone or iPad. Users are left to guess how much battery life remains by how full the battery icon is on the top. System Status (I have the Lite version) tells you what percentage of your battery remains, as well as your disk usage, CPU usage, connection stats, wifi information and cel phone information. It’s a handy app to have on hand if you’re at all curious what’s actually going on with your device.